My heart is aching. I feel sick.
How could someone be so cruel?
So monstrous?
The father tied the boy up and wailed on his ankles until one was so mangled
it looks like he may be limp his whole life.
The small boy removes the handkerchief –
the only bandage he has covering the gaping open wound,
which covers the entire side of his small ankle.
"This happened almost 4 months ago?"
And the wound is still all pink and pussy like that?
"There wasn't money for proper treatment?"
"You still live with the parents who did this to you?"
"You're 15?!" He looks maybe 12.
I sit down next to him trying to take it in.
My heart is aching. I feel sick, repulsed by the cruelty.
Compassion swells for Michael as I think about what his life must be like.
Filled with fear.
Maybe hate.
Maybe shame.
So he stole some money from his home to buy food.
That's because you're not feeding him!
His boney little legs can prove that!
I don't care what he does, you can't beat him like that!
We take the boy and his small brother home so Pastor can talk to his parents.
They agreed to take him to get proper medical care under threat of being reported.
I kept my suggestions to myself, but it didn't keep me from seeing the father and picturing giving him a beating myself.
It's hard to imagine forgiveness in situations like this.
Here's a taste of what we experience on the Race.
A morning at the farm spraying animals turns to bawling my eyes out praying for a beaten child.
You never know what your day might look like.
At least now when I see this stuff I don't get angry at God.
I have come to trust that God is perfectly good.
He created us with free will – the capacity to choose good or evil.
He wants us to choose to love Him.
To choose to love others.
To choose good.
If he forced us to love him or love others, we would be as good as robots following commands.
But God wanted more from us and more for us.
But because of our capacity to choose, we find evil in the world.
Then I questioned why God doesn't always step in to rescue us.
But that goes back to free will – if he always stepped in that would negate choice.
And so we find evil.
But I can trust that "God makes all things work for the good of those who love him" (Romans 8:28).
So as I cry out in prayer for Michael and others like him, I trust my God.
My God loves.
My God cares.
Just look at Jesus to see the Father's character.
His Compassion.
His radical love.
His delight in children.
I trust Jesus.
He has good and perfect plans for all of his children.
